The intervention in this study connects microeconomics and ethics courses within a multidisciplinary PPE curriculum (Politics, Philosophy, and Economics). Thereby it adds to knowledge about interdisciplinary teaching. 

Background information

This project contributes to the literature on interdisciplinary teaching by describing, analyzing, and evaluating an interdisciplinary intervention while students are still gaining disciplinary grounding. The intervention bridges courses in microeconomics and ethics in an interdisciplinary PPE program (Politics, Philosophy, and Economics).

Aims

The intervention focuses on the travelling concepts of voluntariness and value in a potential market for kidneys. The idea of picking a concrete topic to teach general interdisciplinary skills was motivated by the notion of authentic learning. The question is whether a 15-minute video clip on travelling concepts can help students build interdisciplinary skills.

Project description

Students in the treatment group watched a 15-minute video clip on the travelling concepts of value and voluntariness in the context of a potential market for kidneys. Students in the control group watched a clip only on the specific issue of a market for kidneys, but not using travelling concepts.

Results

An exploratory survey (N=44) indicates that the intervention increases interdisciplinary skills more than the control. However, students in the control group reported a deeper interdisciplinary grasp of the specific topic of a potential market for kidneys. Hence, there seems to be some tradeoff between teaching the specific topic and teaching general interdisciplinary skills. Teaching an issue through travelling concepts can be seen as an investment in general interdisciplinary skills. Further experiments and research may try to run similar comparisons in larger groups of students, as well as investigating whether the strong points of both clips could be combined in one clip.

References

• Anderson, E. (1993). Value in Ethics and Economics. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
• Bal, M. (2002). Travelling Concepts in the Humanities: A Rough Guide. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
• Satz, D. (2008). The Moral Limits of Markets: The Case of Human Kidneys. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, CVIII(3), 269–288.